BIRMINGHAM, Alabama -- Listeners in Birmingham longing for music of the distant past have had to rely mostly on touring groups in recent years. But UAB's music department is offering hope, thanks to a faculty development grant to refurbish a harpsichord and host early music specialists.

A concert on Sunday, Feb. 10, will launch the Collegium Musicum series, and will be led by UAB vocal music professor Kristine Hurst-Wajszczuk. To get things started, an Italian harpsichord built for UAB more than 30 years ago has been refurbished for the concert and will be played by Russian musician Maria Lyapkova. Hurst-Wajszczuk, who has sung with Early Music Vancouver and recorded a CD of John Dowland lute songs, will perform with soprano Elizabeth Packard Arnold, mezzo-soprano Katherine Sherwood White, lutenist Dieter Hennings and cellist JoAnn Strickland. White has sung leading roles with Cincinnati Opera, Central City Opera, Kentucky Opera Theater, and Texas Opera Theater. Arnold studied German oratorio at the Benjamin Britten–Peter Pears School in Aldeburgh, England, and participated in the Baroque opera program, Accademia d’Amore, in Seattle, Washington. Hennings recently performed recitals on baroque lute and guitar at Milan’s Spazio Tadini, the Arizona Early Music Society and the Rochester Early Music Society. Strickland is a former member of the Alabama Symphony Orchestra.

On the program are Baroque lute songs by John Dowland, Nicholas Lanier, John Blow, and François Campion, and arias and duets by the Italian Baroque composers Giulio Caccini, Antonio Vivaldi and Claudio Monteverdi.